Oklahoma’s top education official, Ryan Walters—best known for pushing Donald Trump–branded Bibles into public schools—is now under fire for something he’s long claimed to fight: pornography.
During a closed-door state Board of Education meeting last week, Walters allegedly played a video showing “multiple nude women” on a large TV screen in his office—while a parent was speaking. That’s according to NonDoc, an Oklahoma news outlet that broke the story.
Board member Ryan Deatherage was the first to notice what was happening on the screen. He described it as a scene with nudity and something that looked like a “chiropractic table.”
Board member Becky Carson also saw it and was stunned. “Is that woman naked?” she asked herself. “That is not a body suit,” she later confirmed. Both Carson and Deatherage said the video looked “retro,” and while there was no sex, it was clearly pornographic.
Carson said she told Walters directly: “Turn it off. Now.” Walters looked rattled. “What is this? What is this?” he said, fumbling with the remote before managing to shut it off.
The scandal is especially striking because Walters has spent months attacking schools over what he calls “pornographic books.” He’s pushed to ban titles like The Kite Runner and The Glass Castle, books praised across the country. He even emailed lawmakers last year with actual pornographic images, supposedly to make a point—without warning, context, or proof that any school had used them.
Now, Republican leaders in Oklahoma are demanding answers. Speaker of the House Kyle Hilbert and Senate Pro Tem Lonnie Paxton both called for a full investigation. Hilbert wants “clarity and transparency.” Paxton called the reports “strange” and “unsettling.”
Walters, a fierce culture warrior who brands himself as a fighter for “Christian values,” isn’t backing down. He’s calling the report “a junk tabloid lie” and says the reporter should “find a new job.” In a Fox 25 interview, he said the claims are “blatantly dishonest” and politically motivated.
In a post to X (formerly Twitter), Walters denied everything: “I have no knowledge of what was on the TV screen during the alleged incident… absolutely no truth to any implication of wrongdoing.” He called the allegations “categorically false” and claimed they’re part of an attack on “the values of the Oklahomans who elected me.”
But the incident has left many asking: How can the man who claims to protect kids from “smut” in schools be caught playing porn at work?
If the investigation confirms what witnesses say they saw, Walters could face serious consequences—both politically and professionally.
